What is known to most of us is that “Black Friday” is the day of the year when retailers propose the biggest bargains and shoppers descend to the stores or goes online to take advantage of the low prices proposed to buy what was seen as unaffordable before.
While the term nowadays reflects great opportunities, the story behind it is much gloomier. Way before on September 24, 1869. Jay Gould and Jim Fish were two merciless Wall Street financiers, who thought about buying the most of the nation’s gold, make the prices sky-high and then sell it again for impressive prices. Finally, the plan did not work the way they thought about it. The stock market went down and bankrupted everyone.
In relation to retail and shopping, the common story is when merchants recorded profit after a long year of operating at a loss. People, following Thanksgiving, decided to blow a large amount of money on discounted products.
The term has been used back in the 1950s when hordes of tourists and shoppers invaded the city of Philadelphia while on the same day a big army-navy football was held. The police couldn’t cope with the big crowd. Besides, they had to work longer shifts and couldn’t take the day following the Thanksgiving off.
Following this incident, retailers tried unsuccessfully to change it to “Big Friday” although they turned it into a profitable day. Pretty soon, the term lost its negative and dark roots to become an awaited one-day sales from everyone to make profitable purchases.
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